Headphone amp for Transporter XLR connector ?

[truckfighters]

Dear community,

what headphone amp would you suggest for

-transporter XLR-analog out (does this work simultaneous to the analog RCA-cinch outs)?
- headphone is a sennheiser HD 600

?

any suggestions are welcome!

thank you in advance...

[jmourik]

No idea, just wondering if you have looked for info here:
http://www.head-fi.org/

jan

[tomjtx]

Check out headphone .com
There are a lot of good headphone amps out there.

[chrysalis]

I would suggest HeadAmp GS-X. It takes at least a couple of months to get it. I had on order since beginning of October and I don't have it yet.

I think both XLR and RCA outputs of the Transporter are active simultaneously but only RCA outputs can be attenuated. I use the attenuated RCA outputs to feed FirstWatt F1 to listen to my AKG K1000 and plan to use the XLR outputs to feed the GS-X.

[pjdowns]

I have a Rega Ear which for the cheapish price it is a damn good machine.

If you want to spend more you can get the Naim Headline which is I think about £500 with the powersupply !

Otherwise there are ones such as the Russ Andrews or Graham Slee or MF or Creek.

Depends on your ear and headphones really !

[muski]

I recently purchased the Serious Audiophile Package from HeadRoom, which, for $2000, includes their 'Max'ed out' Desktop Amp, Desktop Power Supply and a pair of the recently introduced AKG 701s. It is connected to my Transporter and sounds absolutely wonderful. Because this headphone amp also has its own excellent oversampling DAC, I can connect it to both the Transporter's digital and RCA analog outputs, and flip between them when I feel like doing some critical listening. (A very, very close call, but I'd give the nod to the Transporter DAC for a smoother, less grainy high-end. I do much prefer the Headroom Max DAC to the SB3 DAC, though)

The AKG 701s are a huge improvement over my Sennheiser HD 650s. I was surprised at how audible the difference was.

Note that this is not a balanced amp, and so cannot be connected to the Transporter's XLR balanced outputs. Headroom does make some balanced amps, but they are even pricier. Also, if you do buy a balanced headphone amp, you will need to recable your HD 600s.

[hirsch]

Note that this is not a balanced amp, and so cannot be connected to the Transporter's XLR balanced outputs. Headroom does make some balanced amps, but they are even pricier. Also, if you do buy a balanced headphone amp, you will need to recable your HD 600s.

Headroom makes a balanced version of the Desktop that is under $1000. This is a relatively new amp.

For the HD-600, a balanced MPX-3 from Singlepower Audio is very good sonically at a fairly reasonable price ("reasonable" in an audiophile sense, anyway).

I'm trying the Transporter with a Singlepower ES1 electrostatic headphone amp driving the Sennheiser Orpheus headphone, and have no complaints. However, this particular setup is not cheap. The SDS-XLR from Singlepower is their best balanced dynamic headphone amp (and a rather stellar preamp also), but again, this one is not cheap.

Note that if you want to use a balanced amp with the HD-600, you will need to buy an aftermarket cable that has balanced connectors on it. These are normally a pair of XLR connectors on the headphone cable (standard was set by Headroom when they made the Blockhead amp).

[jimmy100]

I notice someone on the head fi forums who has had good results driving a pair of rewired HD650s direct from the XLR output of the Lavry DA10:

http://www.head-fi.org/forums/showthread.php?t=212589

Would this work as well with the transporter XLR outputs (i.e. would the transporter supply enough power to drive high impedence headphones)?

[magnanimous]

I think the problem would be that you cannot attenuate the XLR output, so you get no volume control even if you could connect the phones direct to the transporter.

[ceejay]

I think the problem would be that you cannot attenuate the XLR output, so you get no volume control even if you could connect the phones direct to the transporter.

Not quite. AFAIK the volume control works on all outputs including the balanced - what you miss is the option to add fixed attenuation (10, 20 or 30dB). So it would be ok as long as the output level from the TP doesn't completely max out the amps input or otherwise be so high that you end up running the TP well below max output.

Ceejay.